how do you learn mechanics?

I've done most of the raids and most of the dungeons and I still know very little about what's happening ever.

Every raid or dungeon I do is the same thing over and over again. I die die die but everyone else knows what they're doing so the boss dies anyways and I learn next to nothing.

So watch what "everyone else" is doing, so you too can do the same thing.

Pay attention to all the ground markers so you can figure where you should have been standing.

First time you do a new raid or dungeon you won't get all the mechanics. Some one can figure out on the fly, while others won't be understood until you have died a few times to them.

You can either go in a blind group or watch video guides.

Blind learning. Many mechanics are introduced slowly during most fights, one at a time, giving room for mistakes. Often, the first time a mechanic is used is basically meant to teach the hard way, low stakes if you fail. An early failure is something you should learn from quickly before fights start introducing complexities.

Personally I find running with trusts is the most efficient way to learn mechanics (for the stuff they’re available in). Since the trusts all do mechanics themselves, you can get a sense of what to do by watching and save yourself the embarrassment if anything goes wrong while you do. Plus it’s fun to see if any of them fail lol

If a mechanic is not clear to me the second or third time, I ask the group.

Anyhoo, I'm on Sargatanas as well if you have any specific questions

keep doing it. im never gonna understand a mechanic just the first or second time. i need to keep at it

I die, die, die, and try again. Sorry rezers. But at least I'm giving y'all something to do... >.<

Besides looking at the mechanics telegraphs and where people are going, also look at the arena floor. Many trials and raids have floor designs that are meant to help you know where safe spots are if you know how to read them.

For example, if the floor is made of tiles or bricks and there happens to be one particular tile in each of the cardinal directions that is a different color, there is an incredibly high probability that the devs expect you to handle a mechanic by having people stand on the conspicuous tiles. Maybe the distance between two tiles marks the safe distance for a knockback/drawin mechanic, or the minimum dance from the edge of the arena where you can stand without getting yote. Maybe four people are going to get hit by an AoE and the tiles mark the minimum safe distance that the four people can stand from each other without killing each other.

If there are grooves in the floor that look like large circles in a flower pattern, chances are at some point there will be circular AoEs emanating from the center of each circle, and the circles on the floor show you how big the AoEs will be so you can stand outside of them. There might be six circles and five of them will blow up so you need to stand in the section of the floor that is in the safe circle but outside the overlapping circles to the left and right.

If the floor has some intricate design that repeats after 120º, dividing the arena into thirds or sixths, there will probably be some mechanic that has safe spots every 120º or 60º. This type of floor sometimes hints at something like three line AoEs going across the arena, and the safe spots between the lines are marked by some part of the floor decoration.

Knowing that the arena floors are drawn this way and thinking about what different recurring floor geometries are trying to tell you might give you enough extra information to figure out how to handle a mechanic that killed you.

Beyond what Rongway said about looking at the shape of the arena and any repeating patterns(be they on the floor or on the outside since sometimes attacks come at you from out of bounds), i also pay attention to the boss(and the other players if im unsure). For me this means first setting a Focus Target on the boss. My UI has the focus target info in the part of the screen i focus on to keep the timing right for my rotation, procs, and cooldowns. Sometimes the name of an attack will indicate where they attack will land, and even if the name is basically gibberish i can try to remember that "Aetheroplasticene" is the attack that does _____ after i see it a time or two. And then beyond that, i try to watch the boss for physical tells. He appears to be winding up for a big attack with his tail? Then id better get in front/to the side.

And when all that fails, if i dont get it after a run or two then ill watch a guide.

By doing. You can direct me to hundreds of different guides and videos, but I only really know that hitting my head against the wall hurts after trying it a few times.

Patience, practice, study and (if you are fortunate) friends.

Stal did a video for Savage prog, but it can be applied to almost every instance.

https://youtu.be/3JWm5x5Nytc

Every time you fail you learn from your mistakes till you learn the mechanics to it. Also there's videos online for them.

Stal did a video for learning Week 1 Savage prog, but the principles can be applied to almost every encounter.

https://youtu.be/3JWm5x5Nytc

It sort of depends on the content that a person is running, but in higher end content like Extremes and Savage there is boss positioning, cooldown rotations for mitigation / shields / and healing, and timing tinctures + dps boosts.

Ultimately, learning is about communication with others in a meaningful way and practicing the encounter.

A big part of it is also pattern recognition. Recognizing what the various markers mean, and how to react to them. Like, a stack marker means the same thing in every fight you see it; you don't have to relearn it for every fight.

Not to mention, several fights reuse mechanics. If you see a boss turn itself into a ring, or make a ring shape, it's going to do a ring aoe around the arena. If you see a boss raise it's right fist, it's probably going to hit the right side. If you're standing behind a boss and it raises its tail, get out from behind it, because it's probably gonna slam its tail down on you.

I find that these visual telegraphs seem to be the ones who get the most new players, so my other recommendation is to actually keep an eye on the boss, and not just your hotbars. Especially in later expansions, you won't be able to react fast enough to the orange markers to avoid big attacks unless you position yourself in the right place based on what the boss is doing at that moment.

Trial and error. But I run content a lot daily. It's a lot of muscle memory and learning each dance. It helps that they reuse mechs often.

Doing a dungeon/raid once just to clear it, you don't learn much. Doing it multiple times you pretty much learn some things each time you do them, until it becomes routine.

They need a whole dungeon or arena or something like the mid boss of Bardam’s Mettle. Where you just run around reacting to mechanics, but for high level stuff. Or add it to the stone sky sea areas as a new training option.

I wish I could practice mechanics in Stone Sky Sea so I don't waste everyone's time

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Originally Posted by CirenInus

I've done most of the raids and most of the dungeons and I still know very little about what's happening ever.

Every raid or dungeon I do is the same thing over and over again. I die die die but everyone else knows what they're doing so the boss dies anyways and I learn next to nothing.

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When I go into new instances (whether on ps5 or pc), i record my entire game play. After i finish it, I go back and watch it > note the mechanic that pops up that killed me > and follow the screen of what other players are doing. Then I write it down and save it for later info on how to increase my dps window for the next time it comes up. If the same mechanic comes up multiple times, I'll record the % of each attack, and count in between for how long it takes before it circles back around again (as a kind of anticipation based on dps numbers)

There are some mechanics I don't understand even after several times going through. But after I play it enough times, I'll eventually notice something I didn't before and will figure it out after that. Not sure how helpful that is, but don't give up!

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Originally Posted by Yuella

I wish I could practice mechanics in Stone Sky Sea so I don't waste everyone's time

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Or a way to queue into an extreme at a specific phase to work on that. There's a mechanic in EX2 that trips me up and I'd love to just practice that part.

Problem with this game is that there are next to no actual mechanics or fight gimmicks like in WoW. There is no intelligence required, it’s a series of obscure gestures and fast wind-up telegraphs you have to know (i.e.die to) before you memorized the pattern and choreography. You can be the best player in the world, the first few attempts you will look like a complete noob.

It’s actually sad that they don’t know how to design real fights, but that might be because they have to limit themselves down to this because of controller players, which the majority of japanese players likely are, since the PC as a gaming platform has been stigmatized over there since forever.

Another good way to learn mechanics, is by memorizing some of the names. Specific ones are often reused on multiple enemies, such as "swing" attacks always being a point-blank circle AoE with the monster at its center or Charybdis always getting you to single digit HP, to name some examples.
Also important to note, is that reused character models often share abilities as well ( like that one dullahan boss from amdapor keep HM having some skills that Odin has as well).

When I'm learning a new fight, I literally take notes. I have plain text files for every extreme and savage I've done.

Look at the attack name, and then look at what happens when the attack goes off.

My static did a blind run of P4 normal together. We died on the first attack, and then discussed it as a group.

"Okay, so standing IN the lightning bolt wasn't the right thing.... maybe try standing away from it? Katarh, you try standing in the opposite corner, Illsaide, you try standing on the corner across the way.... "

By arranging ourselves differently, we eventually figured out the mechanic, and knew what to do next time so we wouldn't die to it.

Repeat this x100 and you have blind prog.

Idk, i just die until i get the hang of it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by CirenInus

I've done most of the raids and most of the dungeons and I still know very little about what's happening ever.

Every raid or dungeon I do is the same thing over and over again. I die die die but everyone else knows what they're doing so the boss dies anyways and I learn next to nothing.

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story of my life; I study the youtube videos and read the guide pages repeatedly until I'm sick and tired of them, yet whenever I get into a dungeon, I see next to none of the effects casting; then, I die. it's humiliating, and I feel terrible for the other party members who are suffering because of me.

one thing I've noticed and wonder about is the game's field of vision. in the videos, I can see the effects going off from a much longer distance than what I see in the playing field in game. for example, in The Final Day, I saw the colliding planets quite well watching the videos, but in the arena, they seemed to be outside of my field of vision. I run the game with the camera pulled all the way back. is there anything I can do to get more range on the camera? I think it might help me, especially while I'm learning.

and no, I can't swing my camera around, I have severe motion-sickness. doing that would just put me in bed with vertigo. I know of other games that extended the camera pull-back range to help alleviate that issue, but none of them are ffxiv, and I don't want to play them...:(

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Originally Posted by Xtro99

Idk, i just die until i get the hang of it.

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This is how the game is designed.
Dying isn’t a bad thing, it’s how you learn!

FFXIV is very streamlined since late HW with the way mechanics are telegraphed and named as well as how arenas are designed.
The most important thing for being able to learn mechanics is actively paying attention. Not just pushing buttons, seeing everyone run in a certain direction and blindly following them but really watching what's going on around you. That's how you learn patterns and get a good feeling for how mechanics work so that when doing any content blind you can already make an educated guess.

Boss raises the left arm and it glows? Problably means a huge side cleave.
Boss cast "double" something? Probably a mechanic that hits twice, dodging into the first safe zone works almost always.
Boss glows in one color while things around it glow in the same and a different color? Probably means standing on the differently colored thing.
Boss tethered you to something/ someone? Running to Narnia works 95% of the time to break the tether and avoid something nasty.

Do content, pay attention, watch your surroundings, keep a close eye on the boss' castbar and watch other players and you'll soon learn the mechanics. Worst case you die, get ressed and can try again.
And thanks to how streamlined most are, you'll have an easy time even when in a dungeon you don't remember doing but recognize the usual tells. It doesn't matter if it's boss A or D doing a side cleave, a side cleave is a side cleave.